Fort San Bernardo—Siege of Fort George—Explosion of Magazine—The Capitulation—The March Through the Breach—British Troops Sail from Pensacola to Brooklyn.

The Spanish operations against Fort George were conducted with extreme caution. What, in the beginning, was one of a circle of intrenchments, developed into a fort as extensive and strong as the former. Like Fort George, it was built of earth and timber. Its position was about one-third of a mile to the northward of the latter. During its construction it was hidden from observation by a dense pine forest and undergrowth, which, after its completion, were cleared to give play to its guns. It was named San Bernardo, for the patron saint of the Spanish commander.

The magnitude of San Bernardo indicated that it must have been constructed for exigencies besides that of assailing the British works. Galvez probably feared an attack in his rear from the Indians coming to the relief of their allies, or that he might have to encounter a relieving expedition coming by sea. In either event his fortress would be a place of security for his supplies and a rallying point in case of disaster.

The siege was a struggle between two forts, with the advantage to one of them in being supported by intrenchments which with itself formed a circle around its antagonist. The latter began the contest.

Among the works constructed by the British to strengthen their position, was a redoubt, named Waldeck. On April 27, a Spanish intrenchment was seen to be in the course of construction opposite to Waldeck, under cover of the woods. Against that intrenchment the besieged directed a heavy fire, but with little effect, as the work was nearly completed when discovered. This attack upon the besiegers was the signal for all their batteries to open fire upon Fort George and its defenses.

The firing was incessant on both sides until May 1, when that of the British was almost entirely suspended, for the purpose of enabling the garrison to make some indispensable repairs on their works. On the second, however, the British guns were again in full play.

But the demand for repairs was so continuous and urgent as to impose a heavy tax upon the limited numbers of the besieged. Short reliefs from duty became a stern necessity, and want of rest, as well as overexertion, so impaired their strength that men were seen falling prostrate beside their guns from fatigue and exhaustion.

Galvez’s failure to storm the British works, during the silence of their guns on May 1, seemed to indicate his determination to reduce the contest to the question, how long the ammunition of the besieged would last and their artillery remain serviceable? He may, however, have regarded the suspension of the British firing as a strategem to invite an assault.

There was a vital spot in the defenses for which the Spanish shot and shell had been vainly seeking—the powder magazine. But as the gunners were without requisite information to enable them to procure its range, it was but a wild chance that a shell would strike it. That its position was not drawn from the Waldeck corporal, is an impeachment of the military sagacity of the Spanish officers, and an act of gross negligence which would have prolonged the siege indefinitely, but for an imprudence of the British commander equally as gross.

A provincial colonel for infamous conduct—of what character we are uninformed—was drummed out of the Fort, instead of being, as prudence required, carefully kept within it during the siege. The man, as should have been expected, went to the Spaniards and informed them of the condition of the garrison and defenses, and especially of the angle in which the magazine was situated. That disclosure sealed the fate of Fort George. Thenceforward, that angle became the mark of every Spanish shot and shell. For three days and nights did those searching missiles beat upon it, until at last on the morning of May 8, there occurred an explosion that shook Gage Hill to its deep foundations as though once again in the throes of an earthquake.

A yawning breach was made in the Fort. Fifty men were killed outright and as many more wounded fatally and otherwise.

At that thunder-like signal 15,000 men are marshalled for the assault. But there is no panic in Fort George. Calmly the British commander orders every gun to be charged, and many to be moved so as to sweep the breach. That work done, he hoists a white flag and sends an officer under another to the Spanish general with a communication, which doubtless had been prepared in anticipation of the conjuncture in which he at last found himself. It was an offer to capitulate upon the following terms: “The troops to march out at the breach with flying colors and drums beating, each man with six cartridges in his cartridge box; at the distance of 500 paces the arms were to be stacked; the officers to retain their swords; all the troops to be shipped as soon as possible, at the cost of the Spaniards to a British port, to be designated by the British commander, under parole not to serve against Spain or her allies, until an equal number of the same rank of Spaniards, or the troops of her allies, were exchanged by Great Britain, and the best care to be taken of the sick and wounded remaining behind, who were to be forwarded as soon as they recovered.”

Knowing that those were the terms which the gallant Dickson and Durnford had demanded and obtained at Baton Rouge and Mobile, the spirit in which General Campbell dictated the terms of the capitulation can be readily imagined. To submit to less than had been conceded to his inferior officers would be dishonor.

Galvez answered, that the terms proposed could not be conceded without modification. General Campbell replied that no modification was permissible; adding, that in case they were not conceded he would hold “the Fort to the last man.” That bold reply was followed by the consent of Galvez to the capitulation proposed by the British commander.

It would be a grateful task to record humanity or chivalry as the motive for the concession; and it would be the duty of history to assign it, in the absence of facts, inconsistent with such a conclusion. But the victor, by his own confession, has precluded such a presumption.^[37] In a letter of General Washington’s to Don Francisco Rendon, agent of the Spanish government in the United States, written at “Headquarters before Yorktown, twelfth of October, 1781,” occurs the following: “I am obliged by the extract of General Galvez’s letter to Count de Grasse, explaining at large the necessity he was under of granting the terms of capitulation to the garrison at Pensacola, which the commandant required. I have no doubt, from General Galvez’s well known attachment to the cause of America, that he would have refused the articles, which have been deemed exceptionable, had there not been very powerful reasons to induce his acceptance of them.”

What, it may be asked, were “those very powerful reasons?” He had an army at his command only one thousand less in number than General Washington had before Yorktown, when he wrote the letter to Rendon; he had ample supplies of every description; he was backed by a powerful fleet; he had selected for his expedition a time when de Grasse’s movements on the Atlantic coast required the presence, in that quarter, of the whole British naval force on this side of the Atlantic; and hence, we can find no “necessity he was under of granting terms,” which General Campbell “required,” unless we find it in his want of faith in his ability by force of arms, to compel the British commander to modify his requirements.

In order to fully appreciate the transaction, it should be borne in mind that there was an understanding between Galvez and the French commanders in America, that he should not grant to British troops that might fall into his power during his operations in West Florida, such terms as would enable them to become a part of the armies operating against the United States.

This understanding Galvez violated at Baton Rouge and Mobile, and again for the third time, in conceding the terms demanded by General Campbell; for the articles bound the garrison not to serve against Spain and her allies only, and the United States was not her ally, but only a sympathizer.

To say that the “powerful reasons,” to quote from General Washington, were not in Fort George, would be to accuse Galvez of bad faith to his French ally, and untruth, as to the existence of any necessity for his concession to the British.

Such being the conclusions that impartial history must draw, impressive was the spectacle presented, on the ninth of May, 1781, upon that hill now crowned by the monument to the Confederate dead. In a circle around Fort George the Spanish army stands in array. The roll of a drum breaks the stillness, followed by the sound of mustering in the Fort. Again as it beats to the fife’s stirring military air, the British commander, in the dress of a major-general, sword in hand, emerges from the breach, followed by his less than eight hundred heroes. Proudly does the gallant band step the five hundred paces; then successively come the orders to halt, fall into line, and stack arms.

The scene would have thrilled the heart of every soldier whose memory is consecrated by the shaft that springs from that historic hill, then the centre of a landscape, whence, northward, the eye could rest on a limitless expanse of verdure; eastward and westward upon the far-sweeping curves of the shore; southward upon the glorious mirror of the Bay, with the hills of Santa Rosa rising out of the blue waters like snow-clad peaks above the azure of a distant horizon, and far beyond them upon the tremulous sky-line of the heaving gulf.

The formal signing of the articles of capitulation in the Council Chamber of Fort George, which occurred on the ninth of May, immediately before the British marched out, was anticipated in a former page.

On June the fourth the British troops sailed for Havana, where they arrived on the fourteenth of the same month; and thence the same vessels transported them to Brooklyn. A further addition was made to the strength of the British, by the garrisons of Baton Rouge and Fort Charlotte, which after many obstacles, and several voyages from point to point, finally reached Brooklyn about the time the Pensacola troops arrived there. And thus, in consequence of Galvez’s breach of faith, a force of 1,200 veterans, with their gallant officers, was added to the British army.

It was doubtless this accession of British strength, at New York, in that rallying year, when each side required every available man, that caused de Grasse to complain to the Spanish government of the capitulation at Pensacola, and called forth the apology of Galvez referred to by General Washington in his letter to Rendon.